All Shook Up
by fleurofthecourt
Summary: When Peter and Neal are trapped in an elevator, eventually things get emotional. [Neal/Peter]


"You, afraid of the dark. Now this, I wish I could really see so I could believe it," Peter said with a light chuckle as Neal slid surreptitiously closer to him. Peter imagined that, though he couldn't see it, Neal was raising his eyes at him in faint annoyance.

They had been trapped together in one of the FBI's elevators ever since the building's power had gone out thirty minutes earlier. They had both startled slightly and unconsciously grabbed ahold of each other. Then, realizing what had happened, they had sheepishly sank onto the elevator's floor in what they considered a respectable distance from one another. Peter couldn't imagine what reason other than fear of the dark would lead Neal to close that gap again.

"There wouldn't be much to see," Neal replied sourly. Then, after a moment's hesitation, he added, "But I really don't like that we have to sit and wait for the power to come back on."

Peter mulled over that. He hadn't really been thinking about how poorly Neal did without having something to occupy his mind, with having to exercise patience. But he certainly was now. He had a feeling that Neal's lack of ability to do nothing when faced with a problem was about to become one. Though he was not yet sure how.

"There's not even a backup generator for the elevator, is there?" Neal sighed as Peter shook his head in the dim light of his cell phone. "Then there's not anything we can do. Unless..."

Although Peter couldn't really see the glint in Neal's eye, he still knew it was there. Then when Neal placed his hand on his shoulder to use it as leverage to stand up, what he was about to attempt to do clicked. "Neal, don't even think about telling me you're planning on climbing into the shaft. Because you aren't. We can wait."

Neal started to protest as the elevator car rattled violently, the power flared on momentarily, illuminating Neal's wild blue eyes and then, just as suddenly, everything faded back to black.

"Neal, what if you had been in the shaft when that happened?" Peter said as he stood up and walked around the back part of the elevator, pressing his fingers to the bridge of his nose, glad that Neal couldn't see him at the moment. It had already been a particularly long day with nothing to do but mortgage fraud case files, three of which had been just puzzling enough to keep them there an hour late.

The last thing he needed was for his partner to remind him that he had some kind of death wish. Or, rather, he rationed, that Neal believed that he was a cat with infinite lives. He rubbed his hands down his face as he wondered when Neal would realize that he couldn't always land on his feet.

That's when it dawned on him that Neal hadn't answered him. He reached for where Neal had been right before the power surge, "Neal? Neal?"

When Neal still didn't answer, trying not to panic, he crawled across the floor until he found Neal's wrist. Neal still didn't respond.

Once he was content that all of Neal's vital signs were in check, he hypothesized that he had hit his head against the elevator wall when the car had shook and been knocked back. He reached for the elevator's emergency phone and called down to to tell them that Neal was now unconscious.

They told him that there wasn't really going to be anything more he could do except wait for either Neal to come to or the power to come back on, whichever came first. They also offered that there didn't seem to be any immediate reason to worry since Neal was breathing and didn't seem to be bleeding.

Finding that he was finally able to, he breathed a sigh of relief.

He couldn't count the number of times he'd been rendered breathless by Neal's reckless antics, and while he knew this wasn't really one of them, it wasn't exactly from Neal's lack of trying. He didn't want to relive any of those moments, those moments when for a few flickers of a second, he saw a life without Neal in it. A life where he can't even imagine the hijinks that Neal is up to when he isn't in New York, when he isn't with him. They are some of the worst moments of his life.

He tried to keep them at bay, but with absolutely nothing to distract him, images of Neal's form lying lifeless on the floor of a vacuum sealed room, of Neal jumping through mid-air to a tram that seemed out of reach, of Neal's suit jacket whipping backwards as he fell to the ground of a parking garage all sprang unbidden into his mind.

He always did his best to protect Neal, but when Neal's greatest danger was himself, he wasn't sure how he could.

Neal scared the hell out of him.

As each minute passed and nothing changed, Peter held on to Neal's wrist like a lifeline. He tried to focus on things outside of the elevator, on work, on how El's catering event was going, on how that Yankees game last weekend should have gone. But the only thing he was really thinking about was the pulse against his thumb and the slow but steady in and out of Neal's breathing. He couldn't stop listening to Neal's anymore than he could stop his own.

The elevator phone rang, startling him out of his vigil. He reluctantly crossed to the other side to answer it. He was informed that the power should be coming back on very soon, but if necessary, they would pull the elevator down manually.

The sudden urgency of the emergency personnel made him more anxious than he had been before. Warily, he moved to stand above Neal, shifting uneasily from foot to foot as he continued to attune himself to the soft hum of his chest.

Then, thankfully, Neal groaned from the floor, before groggily asking, "Ugh... we're still in the elevator?"

"I suppose knocking yourself out didn't get you very far, did it?" Peter said, satisfied that he knew where they were; that was a good sign. Peter turned his attention from Neal to let the emergency personnel know that they could wait.

Neal pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and turned its illumination on Peter.

"And you thought I was afraid in here," Neal laughed faintly. "Peter, you're practically pacing."

"So I am. You had me worried," Peter said, his voice cracking. He stopped moving and slid back down next to Neal. "Don't do that again."

"I wasn't planning on it," Neal said lifting his head up and moving it onto Peter's lap. "Hey, are you okay?"

"Am I okay?" Peter repeated. "No, Neal, I'm not okay. It's hard to be when I spend so much of my time making sure you're still breathing."

"Maybe you should invest in a tricorder," Neal said. "Save you some time and hassle."

Peter ruffled Neal's hair. "Maybe I should. Until the FBI can offer such futuristic technology to its employees, can you try not to do anything that's going to prevent it?"

"All I did was stand," Neal protested.

"Yeah, this time," Peter said.

"Make me the same promise," Neal said, his bright blue eyes locking onto Peter's in the dim light.

When Peter snorted, Neal took Peter's hand with his and said with unwavering sincerity, "Peter, don't think I'm alone in this. I've given you a few scares? Well, remember that you've given me my fair share too. You were poisoned, kidnapped, and in a car accident, off the top of my head."

Neal paused, then added, "If we presented the facts to Moz this concisely, he might think there was some conspiracy causing bad things to befall us."

Peter laughed as tears formed in his eyes. "We've really got to stop doing this to each other, and never give Mozzie all the facts."

"Agreed on both counts," Neal said.

"Neal, just in case..." Peter said knowing Neal would fill in the blanks. Just in case any of this ever fell through the cracks. Just in case one of them let that bad thing looming around the corner get to them. Just in case they lost each other.

"I know. Me too," Neal said squeezing Peter's hand. "Always."

As Neal lifted his hand to his lips, Peter realized that he knew exactly why Neal had closed the space between them before. Really, he'd always known. He'd stubbornly refused to see the forest for the trees.

He pressed his own lips to Neal's forehead. "I'd say we could discuss this later, but we are trapped in an elevator."

"Couldn't have planned this better if I'd tried," Neal said.

"I know there's no possible way you could have planned this, but I'm assuming that you did anyway," Peter said.


End file.
